My family came into town on Saturday, and we hung out downtown with them on Saturday night. On Sunday, we all met up in Chinatown for Dim Sum, along with Liz’s parents. We met up at Phoenix, and this was Julie and Bob’s first experience with Dim Sum (my mom spent a lot of the meal introducing various dishes to them, and making sure their plates were never empty).

Later in the evening, my parents came over and stopped off at (where else) a nearby Chinese restaurant for some take-out. The dining room table was covered with a lot of stuff, so we set up shop at the kids’ table. Is there anything more quintessentially American than Chinese food at Christmastime?

I realized I took way fewer pictures than normal this weekend, which I guess is a good sign that I was enjoying hanging out more than I was documenting. We had a fun late-night excursion to Oink’s Ice Cream and Yogurt on Saturday night, which I’ll try to get photos of next time we’re there. Given how often we’ve hit up Michigan this year… I see it fast being our favorite family vacation spot.

Over the holidays, one of the gifts we gave Jasmine and Jahnu was a set of personalized stamps, featuring them making silly faces. Liz and I were delighted to see that it’s gotten them interested in mailing letters, and we can’t wait to write back.

Stacey, Shane and the kids came in to Chicago on Friday, and we spent a lot of that time eating and hanging out. On Friday, shortly after they arrived, we met up with them at Rainforest Cafe (which was really close to their hotel). On Saturday, we trekked out to Lincoln Park Zoo to walk around a bit – a trip the kids were excited to make, to visit the gorillas.

Surprisingly, the kids were incredibly patient and let us sleep in on Christmas Day. Liz and I were both pretty under the weather (I had a cough and a fever that wouldn’t go away, she was just starting to get sick with a non-stop headache). We slept in until around 10:00 AM and the kids were nice enough to wait…

The image I used was of Jasmine and Jahnu, when they were visiting Grandma Phoebe last Christmas. I asked them to make a serious face, and then a silly one. Of course, I used the silly one to create the stamps.

Originally, we were told to head south as there was the promise of seals. But after crossing over a wide expanse of wet rocks (a pretty difficult terrain, even for the adults), we decided to turn back and head the other direction.

The morning after the wedding, we all made a return trip to Hong Kong Flower Lounge Restaurant – the place we had dinner, our first night on arriving. The Liu family got together to have an early dim sum, and my mom and dad would be switching over… travelling and staying with my Uncle Eddie and his family for a few more days in California.

While some of the girls went shopping, I hung out at the house with Courtney’s boyfriend Andrew and Jahnu. We ended up watching Jahnu playing with a (totally sweet) toy gun, and gave him some target practice assignments. Andrew is in the background providing commentary, using a tiny toy megaphone that distorts voices into robotic voices.

As luck would have it, my sister and her family were heading in to Chicago the very same weekend Liz and I were leaving town. Though we didn’t get to hang out with them at all, it timed out pretty well as they were able to stay in our apartment while we were gone.